What would it be like to be told at age 27 that for the next four
decades you were going to have to kill, starve and oppress millions of
people if you wanted to stay alive? A strange question you may think,
and yet not an unreasonable one. It is after all, precisely what
happened to Kim Jong-un, the son of Kim Jong-il and now leader of the
world’s most oppressive state.
I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately, thanks to a clip I saw
last week of a celebration on North Korean TV. The cameras were inside a
huge hall, filled with rows of identically dressed apparatchiks who
were clapping in unison. On stage, ancient generals and desiccated party
figures stared directly ahead, stiff as mummies. Above them were huge
images of Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il - dead yes, but incredibly happy.
And then, Kim Jong-un appeared. A general approximately three apples
high and wearing a hat the size of a satellite dish held his chair as
the fat and sullen “brilliant comrade” sat down.
So ronerey
It was what happened next that caught my attention. Kim Jong-il
always gave the impression that he was delighted with himself as far as
diabolical dwarves go. He was confident, cheerful… perhaps he actually
enjoyed all that terror and violence. But as for Kim Jong-un, well, his
body language tells a different story. As the zombies applauded, he sat
slouched forward in his chair, leafing idly through some papers. He
looked this way, that way, clearly wishing he was somewhere else. The
question is: where? In one of his father’s pleasure palaces, surrounded
by the cream of North Korea’s young females… or in an entirely different
reality altogether, one where he is not the son of Kim Jong-il?
And thus I feel sympathy for Kim Jong-un. When I look at him on TV I
see not only boredom, but also confusion, anxiety, and fear. Initially
he looked stunned to be standing before crowds of thousands of weeping
people. You could see him thinking: What’s going on? Is this all mine?
How do I work it? What happens if I mess up?
Indeed, it was rather unfair of his father to drop this awesome
responsibility upon him so suddenly, as Kim Jong-il himself was able to
spend decades practicing his evil. He started with little murders,
orchestrating car crashes for members of the party hierarchy who opposed
the principle of hereditary succession, for instance. Thus by the time
the 1990s came round, he had built up the experience required to
sentence millions to death by starvation.
But the country Kim Jong-un has inherited is a much bigger disaster
area than the country Kim Jong-il inherited from his father, so he will
have to leap to mega violence very early on in his career. And while Kim
Jong-il’s former sushi chef Kenji Fujimoto may say that the new leader
is as ruthless as his father ("he knows how to be angry and how to
praise. He has the ability to lead people... also he loves basketball,
roller-blading, snowboarding and skiing... I watched him play golf once
and he reminded me of a top Japanese professional.") it takes more than
mere ruthlessness and mad hoop skillz to survive as a totalitarian
despot. You need to be cunning, a master of divide and rule, adept at
generating fear and paranoia in your inner circle. There will always be
somebody eager to kill you, to seize all that power, should you show
signs of weakness.
Also, if I were Kim Jong-un I would be seriously contemplating the
history of political dynasties. He is the third in line, following two
world class monsters. And how often does that kind of talent, or indeed
any talent, pass to the third generation without a diminution? Never.
Don’t take it from me. Kim Jong-un’s big (half) brother Kim Jong-nam
agrees. In an interview with a Japanese journalist he
confessed: “Jong-un might look like our grandfather (Kim Il-sung), but
I’m worried how he can satisfy his people.”
In fact, Kim Jong-nam claims that Kim Jong-il was aware of the risks
of passing power to the third generation, but members of his inner
circle insisted on it. And this is very possible. For decades, North
Koreans were told that Kim Jong-il was born on Mt. Baekdu, a sacred
place in all Korean folklore, and that not only did a double rainbow
appear in celebration, but a new star appeared in the heavens also. The
Kim family are quasi-divine. How could the North Korean nomenklatura do
otherwise than put one of the sons in charge?
And thus when I watch Kim Jong-un and the amassed generals behind him
on TV, it seems clear that they too are trapped, all of them. Their
gilded cages float atop an ocean of blood so deep and wide that the
waves push them up against the roof of the sky, where the air is
perilously thin. And if anyone dares to open the door and step outside,
he will surely drown.
And thus if he is not yet evil, Kim Jong-un must fast become evil if he is to survive.
Originally published 4/5/2012